Self-taught man grows, carves 500-pound pumpkins

Wednesday

According to the World Records Academy, the record for the world’s largest pumpkin was set in 2010 by Chris Stevens of New Richmond, Wis. His pumpkin weighed 1,810.5 pounds.

In the backyard of his home, Joe Adkins is perfecting the art of growing enormous pumpkins.

Last year, he had one 579-pound pumpkin, and nine more were more than 300 pounds. This year, Adkins, of Wheaton, Ill., has grown two 500-pounders and three 300-pounders.

“The key is to have a lot of sunshine and rainwater … I have three 200-gallon rain barrels,” he said. “But the most important part is to get a seed from good heritage, from a pumpkin that was big.”

This is only his second year growing pumpkins, but the hobby stems from his other pastime of creative pumpkin carving.

Adkins is a self-proclaimed “professional pumpkin carver.”

By day, Adkins, 36, works as a massage therapist at Health Track Sports and Wellness in Glen Ellyn, Ill. He did stencil pumpkin carving for years, but about five years ago, he picked up a copy of the DVD “How to do Surface Carving” at Sonny Acres Farm in West Chicago, which helped his curiosity and passion grow from typical carving into a form of art.

“I was probably carving like 10 years with stencils, and I maxed out the capability of those,” Adkins said. “It would take me eight hours to do (a stencil carving) because I would do an entire pumpkin. There would hardly be any pumpkin left because I would make them into lanterns and stuff. Then, two days later, it was all shriveled.”

He’s completely self-taught in both carving and harvesting pumpkins, and he considers himself a professional carver because people purchase his work.

Adkins sold pumpkins at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Glen Ellyn during its Pumpkin Fest, which raises money for a nonprofit committed to ending homelessness.

Scott Taback, organizer of the event and a parishioner at St. Mark’s, said he met Adkins at Health Track many years ago, and he mentioned his carving. That eventually led Adkins to become involved with Pumpkin Fest.

“Joe does some amazing things with pumpkins, and you can tell it’s a passion of his,” Taback said via email.

Adkins does surface carving, which can allow a pumpkin to last up to a month, depending on the weather. Surface carving is similar to sculpting or woodcarving and involves cutting only the outer layer of a pumpkin.

“I do faces that go along with the shape of the pumpkin,” Adkins said. “I don’t have a predetermined idea of what the pumpkin will look like, I just start carving. People ask what it will be and I just say, ‘Come back in an hour and we’ll see.’”

Depending on the size of the pumpkin, it can take Adkins anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours to carve. For instance, it took him two hours to carve a detailed face into the 579-pound pumpkin he grew last year.

“I like to try and do a broad range of designs,” Adkins said. “I definitely have my own style, but I try to make some scary, some happy.”

Last year, Adkins discovered the Giant Pumpkin Weigh-Off at Bengtson’s Pumpkin Farm in Homer Glen, Ill., where he brought his 579-pound pumpkin. The competition awards $10,000 in prize money.

“In my head driving there (last year), I was counting the money (I was going to win) in my head,” Adkins said. “I got there and I thought, ‘Mine is a baby!’ I got 16th place!”

Adkins said it also cost about $200 to transport the large pumpkin last year because he had to rent a truck with a lift. Adkins didn’t enter his 500-pound pumpkin in this year’s contest because it was “only 500 pounds” and smaller than his pumpkin last year. However, he later found out that if he entered this year, he would have gotten 10th place with a prize of $200.

Through practice each year, Adkins gets better at carving. But he limits his skills to pumpkins. He doesn’t carve wood or clay and has no intentions to try to carve anything else.